Hogwarts always had a habit of leaving Rodolphus feeling drained, which was odd considering so many found a home in the castle. The only upside was that he got to escape some of his responsibilities for a while, or more so, his father. He was constantly torn between worlds, the one he lived in with everyone he knew and the one he lived in with the muggle girl the floor below him. It started with a youthful innocence, a flash of a smile and a ball being slid across the floor to one another. Rodolphus had just left a lesson at the tender age of seven. When his father saw them playing, he politely told Marlene it was time for Rodolphus to go home and took his son with him. Marlene didn’t see him again for a week and a half after that. She was the only thing he ever had to look forward to while returning home for holiday though.
Every time he returned home, she looked slightly different. Older, each time. Hair slightly grown out or clothes fitting in ways they previously hadn’t. There was never enough time to be able to properly memorize her features before he was shipped off to Hogwarts once more. Although Marlene was among the aristocrats of her world, she was worth nothing in his. Rodolphus knew this was a cruel game he was playing with himself, because how was a boy like him— of his magical aptitude supposed to hide it for as long as he has? It got easier as he got older, but questions became more difficult to answer. Tell me about your school— or why have I never seen your friends before? These were questions Rodolphus always avoided. Questions with answers he’d never be able to tell her. Hogwarts was behind him though, along with the extended periods of time he’d have to leave. He was showered with graduation presents, but the best of all happened to be his parents leaving for a business trip to Turkey for the month.
Rodolphus watched the halls closely as he stalked his way to Marlene’s door. This had been preplanned, for weeks in advance now. He’d ordered the house elves to go stalk Evan Rosiers house elves so that they’d be out of the house, and spent the first day he’d returned from school muggle proofing his house. Now that he was legally able to use magic out of school, he took advantage of it. Rodolphus hoped and prayed that her parents wouldn’t answer the door, and to his delight those prayers were answered. “Have you missed me?” He asked her, trying to contain his wildfire grin from spreading anymore than it had. “Are you free right now? My parents are gone for the next month.” That was the best invitation he could muster for a girl that knew she would never be welcomed in his home.
It was summer, which had always meant something slightly different in Marlene McKinnon’s world. It often meant endings, which she was not particularly fond of, but also had things she looked forward to—freedom, sure, which most tended to value greatly, but also something a lot more specific to her experience which her classmates might not share: the presence of the people in her building. Namely, the boy the floor above her.
Rodolphus Lestrange was a boy built more of questions than answers, but fortunately—or perhaps not, dependent on whether he wanted her to know—there were very few ways to capture Marlene’s attention as well as telling her she couldn’t do something, be it an action or simply that she couldn’t know something. Boundaries had never been particularly effective with the girl, though she had no intention of being imposing or invasive. It just made Rodolphus more intriguing, whilst simultaneously being one of the most constant and comforting things in her life. It was an odd thing, deriving comfort and familiarity from someone who was away significantly more than he was around, but it had been the truth of them for as long as she could remember, ever since she was a bright-eyed girl with a wide smile and too much mischief in her laughter for his parents’ comfort.
She’d just been milling around her living room, sporting a floaty cropped top and loose summer trousers to fit her lackadaisical approach to the day, when she’d been alerted to someone at the door. Opening it up, she found herself facing one Rodolphus Lestrange, and felt a bright smile springing to her face on reflex. “Hmm...” she said, pretending to think as she leaned against her doorframe, though the grin she was failing to keep from her face showed exactly how much of a pretence it was, “maybe a little?” She held it for about a beat before just giving in, grinning up at him properly. Marlene McKinnon was made for fighting, but she didn’t see any reason not to let him know that she’d missed him, at least somewhat. Not when he was here at her door, because that indicated he’d missed her too. “Are you propositioning me?” she teased, cocking a wry eyebrow, before pushing off from her door frame. “Yeah, I am,” she added, not really waiting for a response. “Let me grab my keys and I’ll lock up,” she called over her shoulder, turning to the shelf by the door to retrieve her key ring, keying in the alarm code on the way out the door. She was generally very apathetic about the alarm code, but she was struck by a rare sense of duty, and did so before closing the door behind her and twisting the key in, tugging again on the handle to make sure it was locked. She turned back to Rod, carelessly slipping her keys into her pocket. “Lead the way,” she said with a grin, tucking her thumbs into the waistband of her trousers.